New Clothing Manufacturing Co-Op Provides Opportunity, Not Charity, to Immigrant and Refugee Women

Mercy couldn’t sleep. It was the night before her big sewing test — really more like a first-round audition — to become a founding member of Blue Tin Productions, a worker-owned clothing manufacturing cooperative in Chicago. She was so anxious about being well-rested and on time, she went to bed around 6:30 p.m. — and woke up in a panic at 10:30 p.m., thinking it was morning.